Twenty-Five Basic Theorems in Situation and World Theory

Author

Edward N. Zalta

Reference

Journal of Philosophical
Logic,22, 1993, 385-428

This paper is a revised and expanded version of `A Theory of
Situations', Situation Theory and Its Applications,
J.~Barwise, J.~Gawron, G.~Plotkin, and S.~Tutiya (eds.), Stanford:
Center for the Study of Language and Information Publications, 1991,
81-111

Abstract

States of affairs, situations, and worlds are integrated into a
single metaphysical foundation and the most basic principles that
pretheoretically characterize these entities are derived. The
principles are cast as theorems in a precise logical framework and are
derived from an independently- motivated axiomatic theory of objects
and relations. Situations and worlds are identified as objects that
both encode and exemplify properties. They encode
properties of the form being such that p (where p is
a state of affairs). These encoded properties are distinguished from
the other properties that situations and worlds both contingently and
necessarily exemplify, and this distinction offers a principled answer
to a variety of philosophical questions about these entities.